Letters to the Editor 09-25-13

Wednesday

Sep 25, 2013 at 5:19 AMSep 25, 2013 at 5:19 AM

Buy now, save later

The Spring Valley Lake Association currently leases lake water annually at a cost of about $250,000 per year averaged over the past three-four years, which is already paid from our annual assessments. Like anything you rent that's in demand, these lease costs are expected to grow by 6 percent to eight per year over the next 20 years, which will double our leasing costs every 10 years, hitting $1 million a year by 2033 — all paid for from assessments.

By purchasing permanent water rights today, SVLA will own water which can be used every year in lieu of leasing it every year. The cost for purchasing this water today with a 15-year loan generates a payment of about what we budget now for water ($250,000 per year), so there is no increase in assessments needed to pay for the water.

This payment will be fixed for the 15-year period, and be paid off in 15 years, eliminating that $250,000 per year loan payment, but we will own the water forever. At the end of 15 years, the savings to the membership will be substantial, but the real pay-off comes when the water loan is paid off in 15 years.

It's basically a rent-buy decision process one would make for a home. Do you buy the house today with a mortgage, or do you continue renting every year — waiting for the landlord to tell you the new increased rent amount. We want to buy the house and own it in 15 years.

Scott EckertSpring Valley Lake

School already paid for

Ninety-five cents of every dollar going to Victor Valley Union High School District employee payroll and benefits according to signed contracts? Is this true? Who's questioning where taxpayer money is going and who's doing the accounting? Each person who owns a home in Adelanto paid a tax for that school to be built. Why hasn't it opened?

Maybe the fine print in their contract said a school would be built with the tax but said nothing about hiring teachers, administration, etcetera and actually opening the school. It's been a long time since I voted for anyone for a school position if their qualifications included the words "incumbent" or "retired teacher" or something to that effect unless they have done an exemplary job. I would rather vote for a qualified business person who is not affiliated with the teachers union nor had they been.

I hope people get real angry about this and demand accountability of the union and Adelanto as to where that money went, because as I see it, the fox is guarding the hen house and has been for a very long time.

Maybe the school will turn into a sore irritant as long as it sits empty and reminds people that unions are not what they used to be. Now they're just greedy fat cats.

Donna SeepVictorville

They did all they could

Gail Crestin-Bickers (Letters, Sept. 18) says President Obama did "absolutely nothing to even try to save" the four men killed in Benghazi. As an upcoming book on Benghazi reports, a rescue team was quickly assembled and sent to Benghazi but was delayed for over four hours at the Benghazi airport by militants that controlled it. This pretty much destroys the right's claim that no rescue attempt was made, the centerpiece of their entire propaganda campaign about Benghazi. The fact remains that everything that could realistically be done to help those at the Consulate was done.

Furthermore, the war in Iraq was the result of knowingly false information presented by the George W. Bush administration.

Bush also told reporters about Osama bin Laden. "I don't really think about him that much" and closed his investigation unit. It was President Obama who reinstated it and gathered the intelligence that ultimately led to bin Laden's death in a raid he ordered.

Under Bush the NSA did listen to citizens' communications, while the operation under Obama the right is attacking was a specific attempt to find who was leaking classified information.

And how can Obama be "aiding and abetting the enemy" in Syria when we are officially supporting those fighting against the Assad regime? How is this treason?

Donna PelonisHesperia

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